English

The BREIN Foundation

The BREIN foundation is the joint anti-piracy program of authors, artists, publishers, producers and distributors of music, film, games, interactive software and books; A unique bundling of forces of the entire entertainment industry in the fight against Intellectual Property theft. BREIN is the central contact for rights holders, government, law enforcement, trade and media in the Netherlands with respect to all issues concerning the unauthorised copying and distribution of entertainment products both offline and online. BREIN is the Dutch acronym for "Protection Rights Entertainment Industry Netherlands" and also, more importantly, the Dutch word for "brain".

The BREIN participants

The music, video and interactive departments of the Dutch association for producers and importers of image and sound carriers, NVPI.

The Dutch Publishers Association, NUV , on behalf of the publishers of multimedia software.

The Dutch association of entertainment retailers, NVER.

The international organisation of major motion picture producers, Motion Picture Association, MPA.

BREIN also works with the international association of music producers, IFPI and the international association of interactive distributors ISFE and ESA.

The BREIN Mission

BREIN develops anti-piracy policy and directs and co-ordinates the fight against piracy.

BREIN addresses both the wide-spread piracy by individuals and the large-scale piracy by criminal organisations.

BREIN focuses both on the traditional offline trade in pirated products and the rampant online piracy on the internet.

BREIN investigates, takes civil action and supplies information and expertise for criminal, administrative and fiscal action. Criminal investigations are carried out by the anti-piracy team of the FIOD-ECD (Fiscal and Economic Crime Service), which operates under the supervision of a special unit of the Public Prosecution Service. BREIN and FIOD-ECD also work closely with Customs to intercept import and transit of pirate products.

The BREIN Anti-Piracy Program

BREIN executes an integral anti-piracy program, which focuses on:

Prevention and security

Legislation

Investigation: online and offline; private and criminal

Litigation: civil; criminal; administrative; fiscal

Sentencing

Training

Education

PR

In the execution of its program BREIN liases with its sister anti-piracy organisations throughout Europe and the world as well as with the international branch organisations of the audio-visual entertainment industry such as the IFPI, MPA, ISFE and ESA. This international co-operation is crucial in view of the increasing cross-border character of piracy.